Dissertations Update

More Brontë-related thesis/dissertations recently defended:

"My Own Still Shadow-World”: Melancholy and Feminine Intermediacy in Charlotte Brontë’s Villette
by Machuca, Daniela,
Supervisor Clark, Hilary
University of Saskatchewan, Canada

Abstract:
Lucy Snowe, the heroine of Villette, Charlotte Brontë’s final novel, is in constant conflict with the dichotomies of patriarchal culture. As she is perpetually torn between the opposing forces of patriarchy, Lucy Snowe inhabits what she calls her own “still shadow-world” (Brontë164). This thesis explains the nature of the intermediate space Lucy Snowe occupies and examines its repercussions on her mental state. Chapter One theorizes the effect of patriarchal dichotomies on Lucy Snowe to demonstrate that her mental conflict has its roots in the female experience of the opposition between nature and culture. Chapter Two’s analysis of the nineteenth-century medical understanding of madness shows that Lucy Snowe’s melancholy is a symptom of the intermediacy created by conflicting patriarchal expectations. Chapter Three compares Lucy Snowe to the female figure in patriarchal master narratives, which draws attention to the serious consequences of patriarchal culture on women and demonstrates that Lucy is representative of women in conflict with patriarchal expectations. Ultimately, as part of Charlotte Brontë’s endeavor to represent “truth” rather than “reality,” Villette challenges patriarchal expectations of women and presents a different vision of womanhood.

Mötet med det okända: En jämförande och symboltolkande studie av kvinnlig och manlig problematik under 1800-talets mitt såsom den är gestaltad i Charlotte Brontës Jane Eyre och Fjodor Dostojevskijs Brott och straff
by Gripfelt, Ylva
Södertörn University College, School of Gender, Culture and History, Sweden

Abstract
The aim of this study is to investigate how the female author, Charlotte Brontë, describes the development of her female protagonist in Jane Eyre and to compare this to how the male author, Fyodor Dostoevsky, describes the development of his male protagonist in Crime and Punishment, inside the patriarchal 19th century.
My basic idea is that both characters in these two books have to reach their own unknown to find satisfaction and a new existence, and I want to investigate what the characters have to go through to find that existence. To help me in my exploration of Jane Eyre I make use of Gilbert and Gubars’ book The Madwoman in the Attic and in the case of Crime and Punishment, I make use of Pelikan Straus’ article ”“Why did I say ’Women!’?” Raskolnikov Reimagined”. Both authors discuss literature from a gender perspective, but without comparing female and male characters or authors with each other, which I believe is important for a more holistic understanding of gender issue.
The conclusion of this essay is that these books are describing the main characters’ evolution towards their personal unknown with the same tools, a double self, an important symbol, and in the end a love partner that embodies that unknown. Furthermore, I conclude that this development moves in opposing directions, whereby the female character gets in touch with a more traditional male disposition and the male character gets in touch with a more traditional female disposition. This mirrors the different position men and women are assigned in the patriarchal society. In conclusion, I suggest that all social roles are ultimately confining (irrespective of sex), and are attracted to the opposite pole, in order to discover what the individual does not have access to in the social sphere.

Brontë novels and their early feminist companion texts
by Fisk, Nicole Plyler
University of South Carolina, 2007. 201 pp. Advisor: Feldman, Paula R.

Categories: Scholar